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The Movement and Technology Balance
- Grade Level: PreK-12
- ISBN: 9781544350431
- Published By: Corwin
- Year: 2019
- Page Count: 216
- Publication date: June 13, 2019
Price: $39.95
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Description
Educate students in mind and body—and optimize their success.
There is no issue today that gets more attention and incites more debate than children’s use of technology. Technology offers exciting new opportunities and challenges to you and your students. Meanwhile, movement is essential to learning—it increases mental energy and helps brain cells develop. But screen time often comes at the expense of physical activity. How do you choose?
You don’t! This blended instructional approach combines kinesthetic teaching methodologies with technological resources to meet content standards, increase achievement and test scores, and enrich the learning process. Here you’ll find
- A neuroscientific overview of the powerful brain-body connection
- Step-by-step instructions for balancing movement and the use of technology in the classroom
- Practical tools, templates, and vignettes to ensure successful implementation
- Classroom management tactics and useful remedies for common problems
Educating the whole child means promoting social, physical, mental, emotional, and cognitive growth. By joining two powerful teaching tools, you’ll prepare students for a bright future—in school and in life—while growing your instructional expertise as well.
Author(s)
Traci Lengel
Traci Lengel is a Health and Physical Education teacher in the Pocono Mountain School District. With more than twenty-six years of experience, Traci’s knowledge in movement education, kinesthetic furniture, motor development, lifelong fitness/wellness, health education, movement/technology balance, curriculum design and educational/content publication has contributed to the success of her insightful programs and consultations. Additionally, Traci is an adjunct professor at La Salle University in Pennsylvania and The College of New Jersey. In conjunction with these positions, she is a designer/coauthor of three graduate courses. These highly esteemed graduate courses, titled Wellness: Creating Health and Balance in the Classroom, The Kinesthetic Classroom: Teaching and Learning through Movement and The Kinesthetic Classroom II: Moving across the Curriculum, have had a profound effect on the personal and professional lives of thousands of educators. Furthermore, Traci is coauthor of the book The Kinesthetic Classroom: Teaching and Learning through Movement, which was published in 2010 and is a best-selling educational publication. Her most recent publications, in 2017, are Ready, Set, Go: The Kinesthetic Classroom 2.0 and in 2018, Classrooms on the Move: Using Kinesthetic Furniture to Create a New Age of Learning.
As co-owner of her own educational consulting company ActivEDge, Traci is a consistent leader in her field. She also balances an additional career position with the company Kidsfit. This corporation manufactures and sells kinesthetic furniture while providing educational experiences for instructional usage and application for these innovative designs. These careers allow her to show others how to utilize active teaching methods in a variety of settings to enhance educational achievement and peak performance of learners of all ages and abilities. Traci travels extensively to support and promote her passion for improving the health and well-being of children all over the world, while bringing learning to life.
Known for her enthusiasm, innovation, work ethic and passion, Traci devotes much of her time to both her personal and professional successes. With her motivational teaching methodology, she presents and facilitates professional development trainings and workshops. Traci provides keynote presentations for active education along with meaningful programs in the areas of movement/technology balance, wellness, stress management and teaching/learning through movement in a kinesthetic classroom. Her ultimate professional challenge is to inspire educators at all levels to incorporate movement into their daily teaching. Traci’s greatest joy is the unconditional love and support she shares with her family and friends. She is kindhearted and committed to bringing fun and laughter to education and the people who share her journey. Traci is persistent, dedicated and leaves a lasting impression. She can be reached at theactivedge@gmail.com.
Jenna Evans
Jenna Evans is a teacher in the Pocono Mountain School District with over seventeen years of experience in the classroom. Jenna has extensive knowledge of best practices in Early Childhood Education and she prides herself on delivering innovative, developmentally appropriate instruction that reaches all learners alike. Jenna is a leader in her profession, having served on a variety of committees that support Positive School-wide Behavior programs, Read Across America, technology growth and integration, and specialized school events. In addition, she serves on a collaborative writing team that continuously assesses and rewrites the Kindergarten English Language Arts (ELA) curriculum to ensure her school district is providing rigorous instruction that supports all of the PA Core Standards. Jenna is the co-author of the book Classrooms on the Move: Using Kinesthetic Furniture to Create a New Age of Learning.
Jenna received her Bachelor’s Degree in Early Childhood Education from East Stroudsburg University and her Master’s Degree in Classroom Technology from Wilkes University. She is the co-owner of her educational consulting company ActivEDge and is passionate about integrating kinesthetic education into the classroom. Jenna has formed an instantaneous bond with learning environments that balance movement, technology and innovative teaching methodologies to optimize student performance while educating the child as a whole. In combination with her teaching career, Jenna also dedicates her professional energy toward private consulting and freelance writing for specialized publications and graduate/undergraduate course design in the following areas: curriculum development, movement education, applied educational technology, differentiated instruction and classroom management.
Jenna’s experience in technology integration and design, accompanied with her growing passion for kinesthetic education, ignites her desire to find a delicate balance between the two in her own classroom, while encouraging other teachers to consider the same. As she welcomes continued progress in her current occupation, Jenna is also excited about postsecondary opportunities to develop the future of her profession. When not advocating for positive change in schools, Jenna devotes her time to her family. A loving wife and mother to both a son and daughter, she enjoys spending her days in the organized chaos of raising children. She sneaks in date nights with her husband whenever she can, and together they enjoy movies, day trips, and quiet time at home. Jenna dedicates her efforts to her personal priorities and her professional goals without fail as she strives to continually grow and strengthen her aspirations.
Table of Contents
Foreword by Eric Jensen
Acknowledgments
About the Authors
Introduction
Chapter 1 • An Undeniable Shift
Movement and Technology: The Adversarial Relationship
A Society on the Move
The Decline of Movement >
The Digital Age
The Rise of Technology <
Reviews
The Movement and Technology Balance: Classroom Strategies for Student Success should be on every teacher's desk and in every administrator's library! The subject is very timely in today's culture of the rise of technology and the resulting decline of physical activity in schools. This research-based book shows how to successfully blend intentional movement and purposeful technology by using kinesthetic lessons that can be done for any grade level or content area. Every chapter has valuable lessons and practical information for teachers, administrators, and educational leaders. Become a master at blending technology and movement in your classroom and your students will become successful, healthy, active learners!Jean Moize, Founder and Owner
Action Based Learning
Teachers, stand up and applaud! Traci Lengel and Jenna Evans have created a powerhouse teaching tool that addresses the educator’s dilemma of balancing ever-present technology demands with all students’ critical need for movement. As they state so passionately in their book, this balance must be found before it is too late!
The Movement and Technology Balance is jam-packed with calls to action, steps to acknowledge and address our limited teaching styles, and doable checklists to keep educators focused and moving forward. As true educational pioneers, the authors have developed a profound blueprint for teachers who are following in their large, impressive footsteps!
Candace S. Meyer, Founder and CEOTeachers, stand up and applaud! Traci Lengel and Jenna Evans have created a powerhouse teaching tool that addresses the educator’s dilemma of balancing ever-present technology demands with all students’ critical need for movement. As they state so passionately in their book, this balance must be found before it is too late!
The Movement and Technology Balance is jam-packed with calls to action, steps to acknowledge and address our limited teaching styles, and doable checklists to keep educators focused and moving forward. As true educational pioneers, the authors have developed a profound blueprint for teachers who are following in their large, impressive footsteps!
Minds-in-Motion, Inc.
"The parallel rise of technology and a more sedentary lifestyle has made physical activity in schools immediately paramount! Traci Lengel and Jenna Evans describe this paradox and make insightful prescriptions for solving it. Backed by research to make the case for more physical activity in schools, they lay out several frameworks, in a detailed manner, for its effective use side-by-side with the technology needs of the modern classroom. This book also helps educators find the right balance between technology and physical activity, both of which are critical for all students. The Movement and Technology Balance is a must-have for every educator who wants to improve student attention, engagement, motivation, and achievement."
Mike Kuczala, President"The parallel rise of technology and a more sedentary lifestyle has made physical activity in schools immediately paramount! Traci Lengel and Jenna Evans describe this paradox and make insightful prescriptions for solving it. Backed by research to make the case for more physical activity in schools, they lay out several frameworks, in a detailed manner, for its effective use side-by-side with the technology needs of the modern classroom. This book also helps educators find the right balance between technology and physical activity, both of which are critical for all students. The Movement and Technology Balance is a must-have for every educator who wants to improve student attention, engagement, motivation, and achievement."
Kuczala Consulting, Inc
"Traci Lengel and Jenna Evans not only make a compelling argument for the benefits of kinesthetic teaching in the modern classroom, but also provide educators with the practical skills necessary to increase motivation, engagement, and achievement. 'Movement' should be the new movement in education."Rose Minniti, EdD, Superintendent of Schools and Adjunct Professor
Valley View School District and Wilkes University, PA
"Unfortunately, technology use and social isolation have replaced physical activity and interpersonal relationships in many schools. Educators need a resource to assist learners to navigate this new terrain, which can lead to increased health disparities and even premature death. Traci Lengel and Jenna Evans have developed a brilliant direct application process for today's teachers.
As a college professor in School Health Education who trains Health and Physical Education majors to be successful in the K-12 environment, I believe this book is a perfect resource and accomplishes the following: It integrates technology to change negative health behaviors by increasing movement through learning, provides a recipe for developing the whole child to decrease long term health disparities, offers a skills-based approach to teaching the importance of movements and life skills toward health literacy, and utilizes differentiated instruction through technology with a focus on kinesthetic learning.
This 21st century educational resource demonstrates the paradigm shift needed to be successful teaching in today's K-12 environment and meet the societal challenges in how youth develop individually and interact personally. The Movement and Technology Balance is a must-read for all teachers.
Kimberley Razzano, Department Chair, Health Studies"Unfortunately, technology use and social isolation have replaced physical activity and interpersonal relationships in many schools. Educators need a resource to assist learners to navigate this new terrain, which can lead to increased health disparities and even premature death. Traci Lengel and Jenna Evans have developed a brilliant direct application process for today's teachers.
As a college professor in School Health Education who trains Health and Physical Education majors to be successful in the K-12 environment, I believe this book is a perfect resource and accomplishes the following: It integrates technology to change negative health behaviors by increasing movement through learning, provides a recipe for developing the whole child to decrease long term health disparities, offers a skills-based approach to teaching the importance of movements and life skills toward health literacy, and utilizes differentiated instruction through technology with a focus on kinesthetic learning.
This 21st century educational resource demonstrates the paradigm shift needed to be successful teaching in today's K-12 environment and meet the societal challenges in how youth develop individually and interact personally. The Movement and Technology Balance is a must-read for all teachers.
East Stroudsburg University, PA